on our broadcast tonight, from education nation in new york, drawing the line. the president today with a strong new warning to iran, plus what he had to say about the recent violence against americans. where they stand. a rare chance to hear from both candidates right here on one critical issue, education and how to fix american schools. our interviews with the president and governor romney here tonight. the replacement. the call that had football fans across the country howling at the nfl to bring back the professional referees. and tighten up. how little space could you live in? some folks in san francisco are about to find out. "nightly news" begins now. captions paid for by nbc-universal television good evening and tonight we're in midtown manhattan, high above the new york city public

library, which for the past few days has been the headquarters of education nation, our annual summit on education where today we heard from both president obama and mitt romney, a rare and fascinating opportunity to hear them both out on one issue in the same day, something they say should be a big national priority. both men crisscrossed new york today, both made news during their travels. romney in what he told us, and his visit with bill clinton and president obama who stepped before the united nations general assembly talked about the recent violence against americans and explained a few things about our country to a global audience while putting some in the audience today on notice. we begin with our chief white house correspondent chuck todd. chuck, good evening. >> reporter: good evening, brian. president obama and mitt rom jammed as many meetings as they could today in a whirlwind trip to the big apple. while they didn't trade too many

barbs, they did draw a contrast on serious issues and even less serious issues. the centerpiece of the president's visit to new york, his speech to the u.n. general assembly, focusing on the unrest in libya and the middle east. at times emotional. >> the attacks on the civilians from benghazi were attacks on americans. there should be no doubt that we will be relentless in tracking down the killers and bringing them to justice. and on this we must agree. there is no speech that justifies mindless violence. >> reporter: president obama also appeared to draw a real line in the sand about iraq's nuclear weapons. >> let me be clear. america wants to resolve this issue through true diplomacy and we need the time and space to do so. a nuclear armed iran is not a challenge that can be contained. >> reporter: but the president's strong words weren't enough to satisfy mitt romney. >> we can look at the record for

the last four years s.iran closer to a nuclear weapon or not? and we know the answer. it's closer to a nuclear weapon. >> reporter: it was a whirlwind day of media appearances for both romney and the president. it was hard to miss them, either physically in new york or on tv. >> i'm just supposed to be eye candy here for you guys. >> and both trying to one-up each other in praising bill clinton at the former president's annual conference on global giving. >> if there's one thing we have learned in this election season by the way, it is that a few words for bill clinton can do a man a lot of good. all i got to do now is wait a couple of days for that bounce to happen. >> president clinton, thank you for your very kind introduction, although i have to admit, i really did like the speech a few weeks ago a little bit better. >> reporter: romney is already back on the campaign trail and on his economic message. in ohio late this afternoon with his running mate. >> one thing he did not do in his first four years he said he's going to do in the next

four years which is to raise taxes. is there anybody who thinks that raising taxes will help grow the economy? >> no! >> reporter: that comment that mitt romney made about raising taxes in the first four years did raise some eyebrows. the media police continues. ann romney on "the tonight show" and mitt romney to ohio tomorrow. >> chuck todd back at the white house with all of it starting us off, thanks. now to our conversation with governor mitt romney who chose today's interview here at the public library today to stake out some of his major positions on education, including some differences with the president. we started with the lessons from what we all just witnessed in chicago. >> in your view, should teachers be allowed to strike? >> i don't know that i would prevent teachers from being able to strike. i just think the most important aspect in being able to have a productive relationship between the teachers unions and the

districts and the states that they're dealing with is that the person sitting across the table from them should not have received the largest campaign contributions from the teachers union itself. we have a very unusual situation in this united states, it relates not just to the teachers unions, but more broadly. but people are able to give -- in the case of the democratic party. i don't mean to be terribly partisan, but i kind of am, in case of the democratic party, the largest contributors to the democratic party are the teachers unions, the federal teachers unions. it's an extraordinary conflict of interest and it's a problem and should be addressed. allowing teachers to strike on matters such as their compensation, i think is a right that exists in this country. but i do believe we have to have a recognition of the person sitting across the table is representing the public and the students, not the teachers union. >> another issue that came out of chicago, governor, in your view, what portion of a teachers' salary should be

determined by test scores? >> i don't know that there's a fixed percentage, but i do believe that there should be some connection between the capacity of the teacher to move students grade level to grade level and their compensation. i saw a study that was done in boston where they looked at the students in a classroom and how many of those students actually improved a full grade by the end of the year, and there were some teachers that regularly moved virtually all of their students a full grade level or more. and there were other teachers who regularly were unable to do that. well, my view is those who are able to do that, should be able to be more highly compensated. >> you were lucky enough to attend cranbrook in suburban detroit. as of this year the cost of a full year's tuition is $38,900. do you think we owe as a nation every pupil in america the equivalent of a $38,900 education every year?

>> well, i don't know that -- a dollar number always equates to how effective the teacher is. i was delighted to have a terrific education at a private institution, that's not going to be available for the entire nation, but i know there are teachers in the public system that are every bit as good as those that are in the private system. i don't know that i place a dollar figure upon it, and as i look at my own experience in my state of massachusetts, dollar spending per pupil wasn't a very good determining factor of how well the student would do. at one point i looked at all the school districts in massachusetts, we have 351 cities and towns. i plotted spending per student against the achievement of the average student in each district. and there was no relationship at all, interestingly. as a matter of fact, the district that spent the most per pupil and had the smallest classrooms, cambridge, massachusetts, those kids were in the bottom 10% of our state performers. so i realized it's not just money, that it is instead a

focus and how you spend the money, attracting the best and brightest of the profession, promoting the very best, measuring performance of student, giving students the incentives to excel, but the key for me relates it great teachers and creating families that can support their child in education. >> part of our interview with governor prom any here in new york today. meanwhile, the role of those teachers unions also figured prominently into the conversation we aired today with president obama. he sat down with nbc's savannah guthrie, who's here with us in the studio tonight. savannah. >> brian, good evening to you. we spoke with the president over the weekend in milwaukee. i asked him as you mentioned about the teachers strike in chicago which had him walking a fine line in a battle between two of his allies, his former chief of staff, chick mayor rahm emanuel, and the teachers unions he counts on for political support. there was a leading reform advocate who says this shows that there is a new day for democrats. they are no longer kowtowing to

the unions. is that how you are see it? >> you know, that's not how i see it. what i see is that all across the country people want results. and i'm a strong believer that the way you get results is to get everybody involved. so it starts at home. parents have to parent and turn off the tv and the video and make sure your kids are doing their homework. it means teachers striving for excellence in the classroom. it was very important for mayor emanuel to say let's step up our game, and it was important for the teachers unions also to say let's make sure we're not just blaming teachers for a lot of big problems out there. let's make sure we've got the resources. >> mitt romney said that president obama has chosen his side in the fight, that you sided with the unions and another time last spring he said you can't talk up reform while indulging in groups that block it. >> well, you know, i think governor romney and a number of

folks try to politicize the issue and do a lot of teacher-bashing. when i meet teachers all across the country, they are so devoted, so dedicated to their kids. some of the things we've done haven't been popular for teachers unions. i'm a big proponent of charter schools, for example. i get really frustrated when i hear teacher bashing as evidence of performance. what is actually true, if we have got a bad teacher, we should be able to train them to get better and if they can't get better, they should be able to get fired. >> and i'm sure you can recite these statistics by heart. the u.s. spends just about as much money as any country per pupil. people are probably wondering what are we spending our money on then? >> part of the problem we've got is we've got a very diverse country, compared to the smaller countries where all the kids are coming to school pretty well

prepared. they are not hungry. they are not poor. in our country we've got poor kids and some kids who have deep troubles at home, and that affects performance, but there's no doubt that we can step up our game. so what i've proposed moving forward, building off the race to the top, let's hire 100,000 new math and science teachers who are actually trained in math and science. let's continue to focus on early childhood education, makes a big difference for kids who are particularly low income. part of the race to the top let's figure out what are the dropout factors out there. a couple thousand schools where we know they are really underperforming and let's transform those schools. >> in the state of the union you said i'm putting you on notices, colleges, if you don't reduce this tuition, you don't see your funding dropped. is there any evidence that they have done anything to changed? that they have listened to that threat? >> there are some schools that we have. the biggest problem that we have with tuition, especially at public universities, is state

legislatures have been shifting priorities, and what we've said to state legislatures is you've got to do your part and prioritize this because how well your state does is going to depend on how good -- how well your work force is educated, but what we've also seen is schools starting to do something about costs. >> and one more note. governor romney mentioned to you, brian, that he supports pay for performance for teachers. it's something that president obama also says he supports in some situations. >> savannah guthrie following her interview with president obama. all of this brings us to the woman who has been our own in-house expert these past few days across the street here at education nation. our chief education correspondent rehema ellis is here with a closer look at where these two men really do differ on this issue. >> we decided, brian, to take a look at how the candidates come down on some key education issues. on the issue of common core, the national curriculum 46 states already adopted.

president obama strongly supports it. governor romney calls it a mistake and objects to using federal money as obama has done to reward states that adopted common core. president obama has had tough words for teachers unions but has figured out a way to work with them. governor romney has also had sharp things to say about the unions. he believes they don't always work in the interest of students. president obama is in favor of continuing low interest government-subsidized student loans for college, while governor romney supported temporary extension of those loans. he'd like to see the private sector a lot more involved. >> interesting part. my next year's gathering we'll know who will be carrying out these policies. >> we will indeed. >> raheema ellis here with us for the past few days, thank you. the supreme court has agreed to take up a case that's going to decide if a police officer can get a blood sample from a suspected drunk driver without having a warrant. it's a case from missouri where blood was drawn from the suspect without his consent. the trial court ruled it violated his right to be free of

unreasonable search and seizure under the fourth amendment. another court disagreed, and now the supreme court will decide the case next year. when we continue from new york on a tuesday night, they called it a catch, but by which team and which ref for that matter? the bad call heard around the football world has spanned across the country, howling mad at the nfl, and later apartment slightly larger than a toaster oven in a major american city is going to force a lot of folks to ask themselves how small a place they can possibly live in?

last night at the end of the monday night game, it was almost as if you could run to the window and hear other football fans screaming in anger and disgust over an appallingly bad call that decided the outcome of the game and focused the attention of the world on the lockout of the nfl's regular professional refs and the hiring of replacements. our report tonight from notre dame grad and longtime football fan ann thompson. >> reporter: it was a hail mary pass. >> the game's final pass is a wilson lob to the end zone. >> reporter: but the call on the field -- >> touchdown! one guy goes touchdown and the other says no catch. >> reporter: was to many a mortal sin. >> feels like a jennings intercepti interception. >> reporter: after three weeks of questionable calls, missed calls and disorganization the touchdown that gave seattle a

victory over green bay blew the lid over the issue of the nfl's replacement refs. grand larceny screamed one wisconsin paper. green bay nicknamed title town was just ticked off. >> jennings came down with that ball. >> it was really a bad loss because of a bad call. >> i have a bad taste in my mouth. >> reporter: nfl hokd out the referees union in june and the two sides are still fighting over economic and training issues. seahawk fans want it over, too. >> we're concerned about the players. we're concerned about the integrity of the game. it's time to get the regular officials back. >> reporter: today football made string bed flows with wisconsin governor scott walker no fan of unions tweeted return the real refs. packer fan and republican vice presidential candidate paul ryan took to the stump. >> it is time to get the real refs. >> reporter: even the president posted on twitter. nfl fans on both sides of the aisle hope the refs' lockout is settled soon. >> monday night, the wrong team won a game, a very big game, and

if the green bay packers miss the playoffs by one game, they have every right to point the finger at park avenue in new york. >> reporter: home to nfl headquarters. today in a statement the league said seattle's golden tate should have been flagged for pass interference for this push, which would have ended the game. but as for that touchdown, the nfl said its officiating department reviewed the video and supports the decision not to overturn the on-field ruling. >> referee: the call on the field stands, touchdown. >> reporter: result is final, says the league, leaving the fans and players without a prayer. ann thompson, nbc news, new york. up next here tonight, there's been trouble in space, but will we pay the price here on earth?

take a look at these images of the northern lights of the northern lights as captured by canadian photographer valerie pond.

she left her shutter open for 20 seconds. she reports the only real issue was she had to bring her dog along to look out for bears. this has been a peak season for viewing the aurora borlias. there's no way you would have noticed really, but the satellite that brings us this has failed. it's called goes 13. its job is to track the weather and hurricane traffic along the east coast out over the atlantic while another satellite has moved in to take the shot, and while the europeans can help out, one spokesman said there's a chance forecasts will be slightly less accurate here on earth. the half billion dollar satellite just started to vibrate without explanation. henry champ has died. he was a veteran foreign correspondent for this network. he was posted in london, frankfurt, warsaw and washington and covered everything in between. he was part of a class of canadian tv journalists that included jennings and safer. he once said of his native manitoba, 11 months of bad weather, one month of good skating. henry champ was 75 years old.

when we come back here tonight, living on a much smaller scale, bordering on claustrophobic. ♪ little boxes on the hillside

next at 6:00, will the death penalty proposition really save money? new details about an attempted kidnapping at a local school and a significant shift for those self-driving cars. finally tonight, san

francisco is among the country's priciest cities, the housing prices there the highest in the country so now they're trying to think of doing something new, apartments that are not much bigger than a mini storage unit. as you're watching this, if you have a backyard, please remember to count your blessings. our report from nbc's kristen dahlgren. >> reporter: when wayne and tara got married, they knew they would be close. but when wayne moved into her 280 square feet studio, they took shared space to a whole new level. >> it's like living in a hotel room. >> this is their bedroom, living room, kitchen, closet, all carefully laid out. it has to be. >> it's a puzzle. we were able to pare down and we kind of rotate clothes. winter clothes we'll put down in storage when it's more warmer here. >> down the street developer patrick kennedy is putting in a building with 23 microapartments, 300 square feet each. >> so this is the anti-mcmahon

shown. >> reporter: just how big is 300 square feet? about the same as a full-size parking spot. and san francisco may soon go even smaller. the city is considering shrinking the minimum size to just 220 square feet, about the size of a small rv. opponents worry about overcrowding, but the trend is spreading. in new york the mayor is holding a design contest to encourage more microunits there. >> there is clearly a changing demographic and need for a different kind of housing model. >> my tv is back here. >> reporter: beth hennessey downsized from a three bedroom house into this micro unit. once afraid of fitting her life into a few hundred square feet. >> that was a big fear of mine, and it hasn't held me back at all. >> reporter: now living small and loving it. kristen dahlgren, nbc news, san francisco. that's our broadcast on a tuesday night. thank you for being here with us. i'm brian williams, and we hope

to see you back here tomorrow night. good night. right now at 6:00, a new request by the father of a bay area teen who died during a trip to peru. on the 50-yard line of the new 49ers stadium in santa clara, coming up, i'll give you a preview of what's been completed so far. and an emotional day in court. a former private investigator at the center of a scandal learns his sentence. good evening, and thank you for joining us. >> today the silicon valley, tomorrow, it could be widespread. the self-driving car. you just sit there and